Moment student finds deadly Chinese SCORPION crawling around in Shein parcel before locking it in a tupperware container
THIS is the shocking moment a university student found a deadly scorpion crawling around in her clothing parcel from Shein.
Sofia Alonso-Mossinger, 18, first thought the live venomous insect was a toy with her package before it started moving.
The electrical and electronic engineering student from the University of Bristol described the ordeal as “pretty scary”.
Sofia quickly rezipped the bag containing a pair of boots, removed it from her room and called her flatmates for help.
She told the BBC: “I unzipped the outer packaging and saw something move and was like, what’s this?
“I thought I was dreaming. I feel like I am all right with spiders and things but it was scary being in my room with a random scorpion.”
Flatmate Phoebe Hunt, 18, heard Sofia screaming before rushing to her aid.
She said: “At first, I’ll be honest, I said we should kill it and then everyone pointed out that wasn’t the most humane thing so we scooped it up and put it in a Tupperware.”
Zoology student Oliver James used kitchen tongs to transfer the clawed creature into a plastic container.
The housemates then gave the scorpion water and some card to hide under.
The National Centre for Reptile Welfare (NCRW) was called to remove the scorpion.
Chris Newman from the NCRW, said reports of such stowaways were surprisingly frequent.
He said: “The scorpion is Olivierus martensii, it doesn’t really have a common name other than Chinese scorpion.”
The expert said its sting would be “medically significant… potentially life threatening but an average adult would just have a really bad day”.
“It is quite worrying, this is the second one we have had in under a month that has come in this way,” he added.
Chinese-owned fast fashion brand Shein said it was looking into the incident.
A spokesperson for Shein said: “After receiving the feedback, we immediately conducted an internal investigation.
“Our teams on the ground have checked the shipment packing process and carried out an inspection of the goods in our warehouse and have confirmed that all standard operating processes have been adhered to.
“We are currently in contact with the affected customer to resolve this issue.”